bring him to reason, I'll promise. Bullies of
that kidney must be bullied themselves; it's
the only way."

"No, no," said his friend, "that is not the
way. You will get into a row. Sit down."

"Well, you can stay, if you like. I shall go
up there straight; and see if I don't bring tne
fellow to reason."

Ada rose up and stopped him at the door,
laying her hand gently on his arm. "Don't!"
she said. " Why rush into this? It will only
be fresh trouble. There are other ways, safer
and easier, to be found, which we can talk of."

"I suppose you mean going whining and
begging to your banker? You will write to him.
No, I'll just go, as I said. Come, let me pass,
and no melodramatics."

He hurried off. Grainger threw up his hands.
"I suppose I had better follow," he said, "to
keep him out of mischief?"

Ada looked wistfully after them. "They
mistook me. That was not what I meant. Why
do you not do," she said, "what I have so often
said—take up that little money of mine? It is
not worth keeping; and, indeed, if it was ten
times as much, he and you are heartily
welcome. Do, do let me ask you again!"

Mr. Tilney, embarrassed, looked into his
handkerchief. "No, no, no," he said. "Good
child! But better not—far better not!"

Mrs. Tilney was sniffing and moving in her
chair. She knew all about that money pretty
well. "My dear," she said, "you are getting
quite heroic. Such devotion and self-sacrifice is
quite delightful!"

Neither Ross nor his friend returned that
night. The family waited, a little anxiously,
until nearly eleven o'clock. "Drinking, I
suppose," said Mrs. Tilney, with disgust, "in some
of his low haunts. Come to bed, girls. Don't
walk so like a horse, Augusta."

But though they sat up very late, no one
came that night, and Mr. Tilney went to bed
very gloomily, and with genuine sadness, saying
it was getting a very blank, dismal life indeed,
and that it looked very like as if he were, at his
age, to begin the battle of the world all over
again.

The next day passed over, and Mr. Tilney,
going up to the hotel to inquire, learned that
the two gentlemen had gone away by the first
train. On this, he rallied, and came home to
his family with the news.

"Exactly," said Mrs. Tilney. "Just what
I would have thought. Everybody can trade
upon our name and influence but ourselves.
They have gone off, I suppose, with as much
money as they can carry. I declare I admire
and respect that fellow, with all his faults!
He'll get through the world, never fear!"

With a sigh, Mr. Tilney went out, and,
though he had latterly been on very cool terms
with Mr. Smiles, he went up to the bank to
learn something about Ross. But he found
that the secretary had gone up to town "on
business."

"Very odd!" thought Mr. Tilney. "Ah!
every one can go flying up there but me! There
were days when l could post up to town, and
drive to the palace! All troubles
everywhere!"

But troubles were not to be confined to the
house of Tilney. It was a gloomy slate-coloured
day, and the old cathedral, to which he had so
often appealed, looked almost cold and prisonlike.
As he turned a corner suddenly, he saw
running towards him, his white neckcloth half
tied, his hair tossed, and his eyes very wild, the
figure of Mr. Norbury, the canon.

Mr. Tilney stopped in astonishment, and
waited for him to come up. "My God,
Norbury, what is all this?"

"Tilney," said the unhappy canon, very
incoherently, "I was running down to tell you.
What are we to do?—tell me. Poor Jenny and
the children—"

"Why, what is it?" said the other. "Good
Heaven! what has happened to you?"

"We are done at last, Tilney," said he, taking
off his hat, and looking vacantly under the
lining. "It is as if some one had been beating
me about the head. Yes, Tilney, they have
done it. That wicked sneaking Topham has been
biding his time, poking and prying, and picking
up what he could. We thought he had
forgotten it. God forgive him."

"But you don't mean to say, my dear friend,
that he has deprived you—"

"—of our bread? Yes. And there's a Christian
minister—a Christian dignitary, that'll be a
bishop one of these days. God forgive me! I
think I could go out now like one of the evicted
Irish tenants, and wait for him behind a hedge.
I would, and it would be no sin either, Tilney."

"No, no, my poor friend," said Mr. Tilney.
'We mustn't think of those sort of things.
Something will be done; something will turn
up. Your friends will step in; though,
indeed," he added, ruefully, " as far as I go
myself, I can step in very little. But there is a
Providence—"

"O, and Jenny and the children!" said the
canon, putting his hand to his eyes, as if he had
suddenly awoke. "What is to become of them?
Tilney, Tilney, think of that! They will turn
them all into the street. I tell you, only
yesterday the poor girl, who has more wit than I
have, and who has been at me for days, got me
to sit down and write that Black Dick a letter
that would have astonished you—a thing I felt
degraded at doing—putting my very hands under
his feet. And this morning comes the answer,
turning me out of my little house. He talks of
a scandal, does he? Let him take care I don't
do something that may scandalise the whole
place and country!"

"Hush! hush!" said Mr. Tilney, looking
round in alarm, and pointing with his
stick to the cathedral, as it it might betray
them.  "Don't talk that way, my poor
Norbury. It'll do no good. Let us think; let us
put our heads together, and we'll soon knock
out something; though, indeed——"  And he